Tag Archives: brown sugar

So… Has anyone REALLY ever died from eating cookie dough, or is someone out there just trying to damper our hopes and dreams? This is an honest question. I cannot tell you how many spoonful’s, cups, even POUNDS of cookie dough I have consumed in my life, and I’m relatively normal!

This whole salmonella thing (or salmon-In-Ella, as I pronounce it), is it real? TO THE INTERNET!!!

According to the CDC salmonella is estimated “to cause one million illness in the United States, with 19,000 Hospitalizations and 380 deaths.” Oh. Well. What’s my chances that I’ll actually get it… I might take them all for the love of the dough!

In my 24 years I have tried a lot of dough, in 2012 I was on the quest for the perfect low-fat chocolate chip cookie recipe. I strongly believed if the dough tasted good the cookie would come out good. You see, there is one problem with that theory, all cookie dough taste good, and even when it doesn’t taste spectacular it is still not that bad!!!

I strongly believe that cookie dough is the reason that I will never have abs. I can run 8 to 15 miles a day, and come home and “make cookies”, end up eating a good quarter cup of dough and wake up wondering why my weight loss plan is not working. Well, maybe I will add a mile or two to compensate for the doughy desire that I need to fill.

While today’s creation will not help your diet, it will not make you die of Salmonella and that’s a promise! This cookie dough is eggless, super creamy and covered in chocolate, what more could you want? This is the first time I ever made a cookie dough with sweetened condensed milk and I might look into using it more in the future, the dough is super smooth and creamy, what dreams are made of.

If your sweet tooth does not include a love for super sweet, sugary, creamy goodness, do not even bother with this. While it is perfect for the cookie lover, the average Joe of desserts might not find these too amusing. Kids, young adults, and all of my coworkers came begging back for more, and hopefully you will too!

Special Shout out to Zach who submitted this idea!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles

Have your cake and eat it too with these delectable truffles. Egg free will leave you worry free and quickly floating on a bed of happiness and chocolate. Makes roughly 4 dozen.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted

3/4 cup brown sugar, packed

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condense milk

1 cup mini chocolate chips

2 cups melting wafers for the outer shell (I used a bag of Ghirardelli that I found at Wegman’s)

“Santa’s coming! Santa’s coming!” Quick pole, who do you think in my household would be more likely to shout this?

Me

My Mother

My Cat

A small child who snuck into our house at night

If you guessed anything other than, B. My Mother, you are wrong.

Thanksgiving morning every year my mother turns back time and becomes a child. She wakes everyone up at promptly 9am singing that the Macys Thanksgiving Day Parade is about to start. While my father and I stumble down the stairs in our Pajamas and squirrely bed heads, whispering obscenities under our breath; my mother sits like a child on the couch watching the parade waiting for the arrival of the holiday season kickoff, Santa.

It’s a tradition, a weird backwards tradition. The balloons go by, the marching bands, the weird singing acts that get stranger with each passing year, until finally my mother’s big moment. I watch them build, like puddles on a rainy day, her eyes slowly gloss over then overflow with tears of memories. For the past 50+ years my mother has done the same thing every Thanksgiving without skipping a beat, as a child, to young adult, to mother, to now. Thanksgiving morning has always brought her to tears knowing that the season of family, love, and Santa Clause was about to Kick off.

Another tradition in the family is the pies. It doesn’t matter who makes the dinner, or who says they will make the desserts; my family still makes the pies. Until last year it was solely my mother; apple pie, chocolate cream pie, and pumpkin. But some traditions need to be spiced up.

Until two years ago I never made a pie, any kind of pie. You name it, I’ve never made it. But that was the year of the great apple picking. My mother and I went apple picking and bought our weight in apples. We don’t know why we did this, but for the next few weeks there were apple everything. Meals, sides, sauces, turnovers, pancakes, if you are what you eat, I was a big fat juicy apple. My favorite way to eat an apple is on a stick, covered in M&M’s and caramel, that’s when I found the recipe for a caramel apple pie.

It sounded perfect. What is not to love about caramel, apples, and brown sugar? There is something about this combination that is warm and inviting. It is like the pie is wrapping you with a warm brown sugar blanket saying, “sit down and stay awhile”. I made this for the first time at home; it was a bonding experience for my mother and me, my first pie. It came out perfect. Warm, crispy, and with the home made love that you just taste. For the beginning pie maker this is one of the easiest pies you can ever make. We spent hours on the crust (as you can see in the recipe I am joking), after a few ingredients thrown together and an hour in the oven, this masterpiece is complete.

I was never one for cheating, but I like to win. Family monopoly games turned into battles to the death, unless I was the dealer. If I was the dealer, it was always a landslide victory in one direction. I’m not saying I cheated; I just helped out my cause a little.

Cheating in sports is another thing, I never cheated, but cheaters always made the game more interesting. There was always that one team at the softball field that counted too many runs, or sent someone up to bat to early. This was always resolved with at least one coach being ejected from the game, parents screaming obscenities, and at least one girl crying. It’s not a game unless someone cries.

In baking I can proudly say my cheating is minimal. I prefer homemade everything, to premade anything. Cookies in the bag don’t cut it, box cakes can suck it, and store bought can remain in the store. There is an adventure involved in cooking from scratch, a sense of accomplishments, and pride.

Don’t cheat and use a stand mixer, DONT DO IT! Do what I say not what I do.

Today, I confess, I cheated. Today I made coffee cake and used (gulp) Bisquick. I could have made homemade Bisquick, but I’ll save that for another story. This was one of the easiest recipes I could have ever followed, and at 7:00am easy is what I need. I even accomplished this recipe without my morning cup of coffee.

Apparently, this Bisquick coffee cake is a classic. My mother commented how her mom used to make it, and on mother’s day, tradition is the only thing that mattered. The cake part is light and fluffy, sweet and moist, comparable to a slice of cloud from the heavens. The crumbs, if you are a coffee cake fiend, like myself, I recommend doubling or tripling the crumb topping. I doubled it, and still could have used a little more. But the small balls of sugar will forever satisfy my early morning sweet tooth.

The crumbly finished product

Without further ado, here is my slice of early morning goodness. Remember, cheaters never win, but at first they do succeed.

Cheaters Coffee Cake:

Ingredients:

Cinnamon streusel

1/3 Cup Original Bisquick mix

1/3 Cup packed brown sugar

1/2 Teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 Tablespoons firm margarine

Coffee Cake:

2 Cups Original Bisquick mix

2/3 Cup milk

2 Tablespoons sugar

1 Egg

Directions:

Heat oven to 375*F. Grease a 9 inch round pan.

In a small bowl, stir streusel ingredients until crumbly. If you like big crumbs try using your hands. For smaller finer crumbs use a whisk.

In a medium bowl, mix coffee cake ingredients until blended, then spread evenly in pan.

Sprinkle the streusel on top of the cake batter.

Bake 18 to 22 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.